Google Custom Search

October 20, 2012

Nick Griffin, the Member of European Parliament for Northwest England, is our This Week In Tolerance = TWIT of the Week for being an intolerant twat.

British Member of European Parliament And Most Intolerant Brit’ Awarded Our “TWIT of the Week” For Being A Royal TWAT

Cambridgeshire,
England -- A right-wing extremist and polarizing figure in British
politics had his Twitter account suspended, for publicly tweeting the home
address of 2 gay male partners. The Cambridgeshire gay couple were in
the news because they won their lawsuit against a Christian bed
and breakfast owner who refused to allow the men to share a room,
because of her religious beliefs. Michael
Black and John Morgan, had booked a room in Berkshire, and sent a
deposit to guarantee their stay. When they arrived they were told there
was no room at the inn for a homosexual unmarried couple. The court
fined the b & b owner, and Black and Morgan are going to donate the
assessed damages to charity.This
enraged Nick Griffin, the MEP (Member of European Parliament) for the
North West Region, and the Chairman of the British National Party (BNP).
So he sent a tweet to his 17,000 followers asking for the address of the gay couple, and inferred that he wanted to demonstrate outside their home.For
this action alone, and for being one of the most intolerant politicians
in the United Kingdom, Nick Griffin is designated our This Week In
Tolerance = TWIT of the week.

But within hours of celebrations at what was seen as a significant vindication ofequality legislation,gay rights activists were outraged by several messages on Twitter by Griffin, chairman of theBNP
and an MEP, in which he made public Black and Morgan's address and
claimed a "British Justice team" would come and protest the ruling at
their home.

The
first messages read: "If anyone can give us address of the 2 bullying
'gay' activists who've won case v Christian B&B owners, we'll hold
demo … for rights of all home owners, gays included, to rent or not rent
rooms to whomsoever they wish."

Two
hours later, Griffin posted the following tweet: "A British Justice
team will come up to [their Huntington address] & give you [Black
and Morgan] a … bit of drama by way of reminding you that an English
couple's home is their castle. Say No to heterophobia!"

The
comments sparked anger. LGBT Labour, the party's campaign for gay
rights, urged people to report Griffin for allegedly breaching the
Communications Act 2003, under which it is an offence to post menacing
messages on the internet. Others said they had reported his comments to
the Metropolitan police's internet hate crime unit.

Twitter users trying to access Griffin's account were subsequently told it had been suspended.

The
British National Party is a political party that is aligned with
right-wing extremists, and fascist political parties in Europe. Like the
Republican party, they are closely identified as an “anti-immigration”
organization. Their recruiting materials state that they support "firm
but voluntary incentives for immigrants and their descendants to return
home." They also want to repeal anti-discrimination legislation in the
UK, as well as in Europe.

Yesterday I read the news that Michael Black and John Morgan hadwon their case of discrimination against a bed and breakfast owner who had refused to let them stay, and like many, was pleased for them.

This
was a couple that had taken the courage to stand up against homophobia
and they had been vindicated. But within hours the story had changed.

Nick
Griffin MEP tweeted the home address of the couple and encouraged his
17,000 followers to cause a “bit of drama” at their home. And no, he
wasn’t talking about popping round for the Strictly final. For a couple
that had already been through so much this was disgraceful. But more
than that, it was threatening and I suspect, illegal.

I
support freedom of speech – I use it a lot to express my views on
twitter and it’s this exact freedom that allowed me to start my
petition. But I do not support inciting hate crime. And this is the
issue here. Twitter is great forum for debate but should not be used to
incite homophobic hate. The police are rightly investigating Nick
Griffin’s tweets and I hope they will take swift action.

But twitter must act too.

The
“Twitter rules” state that twitter reserves the right to immediately
terminate your account without further notice in the event that, in its
judgment, you violate its rules. It is not clear how “in its judgment”
applies in the real world. We all occasionally get carried away, say
something we don’t mean or something that can be taken out of context,
so it’s good that twitter rules are not draconian.

But that is not the situation here. No organisation can turn a blind eye to homophobia or inciting hatred.

Nick
Griffin, MEP is a Cambridge educated lawyer. According to his Wikipedia
biography, he was a “holocaust denier” for many years. In 1998 he was
convicted of “publishing or distributing racially inflammatory written
material,” which is against the law in the UK.

"I
think Nick Griffin has got very little support in the country," Black,
64, told BBC Breakfast. "Certainly, the public response to the incident,
when it happened two and a half years ago, and again in the last 24
hours, has been overwhelmingly in support of our stand against
discrimination, so hopefully that will mean the vast majority of the
people in the country will just see what an idiot Nick Griffin is and
reject his views."

An idiot indeed!

We
should be holding Twitter and Facebook to the same standards that UK
citizens are demanding of Twitter regarding Nick Griffin. Public figures, politicians and
religious leaders should not be allowed to incite hate on those very
public forums.This gives me lots of ideas. Are you listening Tony Perkins?You can sign the change.org petition here.